this post was submitted on 05 Nov 2023
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Leftism

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[–] LesserAbe 69 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (14 children)

This reminds me of a quote from the Grapes of Wrath, (which is set during the great depression):

The works of the roots of the vines, of the trees, must be destroyed to keep up the price, and this is the saddest, bitterest thing of all. Carloads of oranges dumped on the ground. The people came for miles to take the fruit, but this could not be. How would they buy oranges at twenty cents a dozen if they could drive out and pick them up? And men with hoses squirt kerosene on the oranges, and they are angry at the crime, angry at the people who have come to take the fruit. A million people hungry, needing the fruit- and kerosene sprayed over the golden mountains. And the smell of rot fills the country. Burn coffee for fuel in the ships. Burn corn to keep warm, it makes a hot fire. Dump potatoes in the rivers and place guards along the banks to keep the hungry people from fishing them out. Slaughter the pigs and bury them, and let the putrescence drip down into the earth.

There is a crime here that goes beyond denunciation. There is a sorrow here that weeping cannot symbolize. There is a failure here that topples all our success. The fertile earth, the straight tree rows, the sturdy trunks, and the ripe fruit. And children dying of pellagra must die because a profit cannot be taken from an orange. And coroners must fill in the certificate- died of malnutrition- because the food must rot, must be forced to rot. The people come with nets to fish for potatoes in the river, and the guards hold them back; they come in rattling cars to get the dumped oranges, but the kerosene is sprayed. And they stand still and watch the potatoes float by, listen to the screaming pigs being killed in a ditch and covered with quick-lime, watch the mountains of oranges slop down to a putrefying ooze; and in the eyes of the people there is the failure; and in the eyes of the hungry there is a growing wrath. In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage.

[–] [email protected] 32 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (4 children)

I've never gotten around to reading that book. Never knew enough about it to be interested. At the same time as I was eating on $50 of food stamps per month, I was the person who had to take out all the expired meat and stale bread and unsold, entire cakes down to the dumpster.

Had I taken anything and been seen, I would have been fired. A coworker was fired, for handing it out to the homeless shelter across the street instead. I've never forgotten that.

I'm going to read that book, I think.

[–] JayJay 6 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Make sure to get the unabridged version as theres a lot of abridged versions out there for the grapes of wrath.

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